Sox give up 8 in loss to Detroit
DETROIT — Prince Fielder homered, Rick Porcello pitched six solid innings and the Detroit Tigers bounced back Wednesday night with an 8-5 victory over the White Sox.
Detroit allowed 23 hits in an 11-4 loss to the White Sox on Tuesday, but it was the Tigers who did the slugging early on in this game. Fielder lined a two-run shot to right field in the first inning for his 16th homer of the year.
Alex Avila's two-run single in the third put Detroit ahead 5-1.
Conor Gillaspie and Gordon Beckham homered for Chicago.
Porcello (6-6) allowed three runs and seven hits. Joaquin Benoit pitched the ninth for his eighth save in eight chances.
Dylan Axelrod (3-6) allowed seven runs and 11 hits in 5 2-3 innings.
The Tigers extended their AL Central lead over second-place Cleveland to 3 games.
Fielder, Miguel Cabrera and Victor Martinez had three hits each for Detroit. Cabrera's run-scoring single in the sixth pushed his major league-leading RBI total to 93.
Chicago's Alex Rios was hitless a night after going 6 for 6, and the White Sox never led Wednesday. After Gillaspie's homer in the second, the Tigers made it 3-1 on Austin Jackson's RBI triple in the bottom of the inning.
Axelrod's problems continued in the third when Avila lined a single to right with the bases loaded. The ball landed just in front of a diving Rios, and two runs came home.
Axelrod has allowed 29 earned runs in 28 innings in his last six starts.
Porcello won his second straight start he blanked Cleveland for seven innings last week. Chicago scored twice in the fourth on an RBI single by Dayan Viciedo and a sacrifice fly by Beckham, but right fielder Torii Hunter made a diving, back-handed catch on Beckham's hit to prevent further damage.
Porcello struck out six without a walk.
Detroit added three runs in the sixth on consecutive RBI singles by Cabrera, Fielder and Martinez. That made it 8-3, but Tigers reliever Bruce Rondon allowed Beckham's homer and an RBI double by Alexei Ramirez in a shaky seventh.
Drew Smyly worked a perfect eighth for Detroit, and Benoit overcame two ninth-inning walks to close it out.